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Interview With OKtoshi Lead Dev Of OKcash

The Dood Interviews OKtoshi Lead Dev Of OKcash!

One of my favorite devs in the altcoin space has to be OKtoshi, lead dev of ROKOS OS and OKcash. This guy has to be one of the hardest working devs in the altcoin community. OKcash recently celebrated its two year birthday and OKtoshi was kind enough to take some time out of his busy schedule to answer a few questions for The Dood. Hope you all enjoy reading this interview, as much as I enjoyed putting it together. Special thanks to @OKorator for helping to make this interview possible!

BitcoinDood: Thanks for taking the time to answer these questions. I have to say I was really excited about this interview. In the altcoin community you have to be one of my favorite devs based on the constant work you do, and the different projects you take on like OKcash and ROKOS. For those readers who may be unfamiliar with these projects could you please introduce yourself and tell the readers a little about who you are and what you do?

OKtoshi:I have to say Thanks as well for the kind words and support, and it surely is a pleasure to participate in this interview. I’m Oktoshi and I work in the lead developer roles for Okcash cryptocurrency and ROKOS OK Bitcoin Full node OS for IoT devices like Raspberry Pi, BananaPi Pro and we’re Pine64+ official backers among others; Okcash is a Proof of Stake (POS) cryptocurrency that just celebrated it’s 2nd year birthday and its adoption so far includes OK full nodes in more than 32 countries across the world, adding to the efficacy, resilience, security and speed of the network. ROKOS OK Bitcoin Full node OS on the other part is a full Operating System for IoT devices that includes a plug and play (ready for use) Bitcoin and Okcash Full nodes among other goodies like OpenBazaar on its “Core” version release, more than 14 different cryptocurrencies on its “Flavors” version release and it has more than 5000+ downloads since v1 (latest version while writing this is v7).

The real heroes behind this projects are the users and community itself, I can’t express how thankful I am for all the great experiences, work, feedback and critique that has continuously helped this projects to grow and evolve day by day. I come from a different mix of humanitarian, business, coding, technology, and artistic backgrounds. I started developing and working part time on the cryptocurrency environment on 2012, and joined full time since 2013, since then I have worked and assisted different projects, at the beginnings of 2014 I started to plan the creation of a coin for me and any other user like me, that would really make us love the crypto tech benefits even more, which would have to be a quality work, fast, friendly, efficient, secure, well maintained, and mainly really decentralized and open source in order to help improve where it gets integrated/used, which came alive later on November 24th 2014, since that day I dedicate my work mainly for Okcash core and Bitcoin Full node OS, and thanks to all the Community joining and working in OK, I can humbly say to date, the OK cryptocurrency is one of the most reliable networks anyone can use, and the Bitcoin Full node OS opened a whole new range of trends of integration, experimentation and adoption between the Linux, Internet of Things (IoT) and cryptocurrencies environment, hence empowering all the users of this technologies; it’s been a fun and interesting road.

BitcoinDood: OKcash is celebrating it’s two year anniversary. Both the coin and community have come a long way over the last two years. What can we expect from OKcash as it grows another year older?

OKtoshi: I concur, while Okcash continues to be on its experimental stages, it’s been amazing all the participation it gets as it continues to grow. About what can we expect as Okcash grows; well it is a bit of a difficult question as it covers a whole range of discovered and undiscovered possibilities alike, is like asking ourselves what could we expect from Bitcoin back then in 2010.

What I can say on the other side; is that we can expect more adoption, more projects and markets getting born testing the Okcash technologies, and more features and upgrades based on community feedback and consensus, same as participation, that could get integrated into the code as time goes by.

BitcoinDood: OKcash was a rebrand from a coin called PIMPcash. PIMPcash was a lot of fun, but there was a little controversy surrounding the coin over the name. How did you feel about having to rebrand the original concept? Do you feel the rebranding to OKcash has helped the coin mature and helped it to be taken more seriously by the cryptocurrency community?

OKtoshi: That is correct, and I love that it happened that way, just like Linus Torvalds said, most great things that make it into the daily life usage are born from accidents; well, I see the rename/re branding just as one, as it was fully lead by the community and crypto environment as an answer to adoption and main stream adaptation, with the goal of projecting the coin true goals, after all PIMP was just a smart sarcastic acronym that became a hot subject bringing more awareness about the coin, which really stated Positive Innovation for Multiple Payment solutions; the core idea of the project.

The real concept and vision behind has never changed, which is to provide users a cryptocurrency they deserve (speed, security, efficacy) and can get to love (fun, friendly and easy to use) while at the same time becoming a tool for businesses to become more efficient, transparent and self dependent, improving all the aspects in life that Okcash touches, hence I believe the Okcash re brand by the community has really helped it mature and project it’s vision in a direct and powerful manner, I honestly love it, as it describes and communicates the project and vision so perfectly well.

BitcoinDood: Right from the inception of both PIMPcash and OKcash there was a terrific marketing buzz with memes, and all kinds of people promoting the coin on various social networks. That’s always something I look for when I consider holding an altcoin long term. How many people are currently involved in the OKcash project and what do you attribute your marketing success to?

OKtoshi: I feel is a mix of different factors like its main stream name (OK is one of the only 2 words that can be understood in any language and requires no character translation, and Cash which thanks to the multiculturalism globalization mixture everyone is aware of its meaning thanks to finances, songs, and art expressions of it). It’s efficiency and easy to use approach, friendliness, support and complementation of Bitcoin and the cryptocurrency environment, but of course I feel it has been mainly thanks to everyone that got involved, I guess we all identify with the OK vision and like a lot how Okcash performs, while at the same time everyone enjoys having fun with it and the cryptocurrency environment, same thing that has keeping it growing over social media networks outside the Bitcoin and Crypto space I guess.

Its marketing success should be attributed to the whole cryptocurrency environment and the Okcash community in my opinion, as every actor that have interacted with it has helped with its reach and evolution, communities from forums like Bitcointalk.org, Bitcoingarden.tk, Cryptocentral, Cryptopia, Cryptos.us, CryptoCoinTalk, AllCryptoTalk, Altcoins Foundation, Raspberry Pi forums, Pine64+ forums, Foro-PTC, ForoBits, the different media sources covering and reporting on Okcash developments and events, independent media sources just like Bitcoin Dood, same way the different OK communities over IRC, Slack, Discord and others, and of course every individual as they are the ones behind the Social success of the Okcash brand all over different social sites like twitter, facebook, reddit, instagram among others.

At the moment there is an “Official” communications server (* Official, as far as we can use the word, as it being decentralized, all the Okcash channels created by any OK participant is an official one as long as is backed by community consensus), this server serves for the purpose of supporting the community and new users, share new updates about Okcash, from core dev updates to new OK businesses integrations, events and any news related to OK. Same way the community can get in touch with any of the OK developers or OK core team members, or they can provide feedback, help testing new features, play games, listen to the radio, it is a kind of a development, community and gaming hub. Anyone can join over http://discord.me/cryptocurrency . And while it started just a short time ago, it already has more than 340 members, all of them are a big part as well of OK success, also thanks to greenbigfrog and Gapjustin developments for it, with tipbots and stake bots among others that rain/giveaway coins to active or new members to try out the new OK tech, also OK “mouth to mouth” advertisement seems to work great as it involves new non crypto users that can find a great starting place to learn more about Okcash, Bitcoin and even more cryptocurrencies in a safe, fun and friendly environment, some people already call it home.

In a more direct and daily manner, at this moment; there are 17 members working within OK core team from more than 10 different countries working in a decentralized organization structure that is formed by people working in different areas for OK, like Development, businesses integrations, community leaders and organizers, Marketing, quality & testing, design, funding among others, 6 of them are developers (including myself) and 2 more developers are joining the team in the next 2 weeks, there will also be a contributors list in the community website in the coming website updates.

As you can see there is a lot of people behind the scenes working for the vision and common goal, everything is thanks to them, the visible and non visible ones alike, I guess we could call them all the real creators of the OK community giving life to the OK project.

BitcoinDood: It seems the OKcash community never rests. There are always new projects released, and new marketing plans. Most recently I noticed a push for stores and businesses to accept OKcash and even a directory in the works that will list all the places you can spend your OKcash. Could you tell us a little about okyourday.com ?

OKtoshi: That would be thanks to all the different members involved and their different time zones and OKorator’s organization of the community, so when some members are ending their day working in OK, others are just starting.

Yes, while Okcash continues to evolve, it has reached and proven a level of efficiency, speed and security that will work great for businesses, as it will bring them the speed, availability and security of the system 24/7, hence increasing their tools for success in their different businesses models, at the same time the community has been requesting more places where they could spend their Okcash, being their preferred payment method; so, another community member known as CGB started the project okyourday.com , with the genius idea behind of providing free advertisement to the businesses integrating Okcash for testing in their businesses models called coinmap, which will help different participants reach a wider and new audience for their products and services, while providing a full directory worldwide map of stores that accept OK, helping economies flourish. Might be a good idea to contact CGB for more details about the subject as he has more knowledge of that project and area.

BitcoinDood:OKcash is a POS (proof of stake) cryptocurrency. From what I understand, there will only be 105,000,000 OKcash ever created. Looking at the coinmarketcap chart it looks like there is currently about 68,363,084 in circulation at the time of this writing. Can you explain a little about POS and how the halving feature works as far as percentage earned based on staking weight and of course creation of coins ?

OKtoshi: Of course, glad to do so. Okcash is Proof of Stake, which is sometimes difficult to understand it’s meaning for a non tech user.

For the non tech related at all, it is like earning a compound interest on your holdings, with the difference that with the OK wallet, you are your own bank.

To explain it in easy understandable terms for any new user to crypto that already knows that you can mine Bitcoin with special equipment requirement (Proof of Work); well, for Proof of Stake the only requirement to be able to mine, is to have the OK wallet online with some coins in it. Hence instead of buying special equipment to mine (like proof of work) you buy OK coins and send them to your wallet. This kind of mining process is called “Staking”, hence: when your wallet is mining, in POS it is said your wallet is staking, and instead of saying “I just mined X amount of coins” (on POW), on POS you just say “I just staked X amount of coins”.

Other than that, yes Okcash has a limited coin cap like Bitcoin, Bitcoin coin cap is 21 million coins that will ever be created, while on Okcash the coin cap is 5 times it, mainly because it is aimed to be used for micro transactions as well. The rate Okcash is created/mined/staked changes per year, it has 11 halvings, and the last OK coins will be mined/staked around the year 2148.

This system is the first of its kind, and was developed for OK, it is called Long Term Sustainable Staking (LTSS), on the contrary of Proof of work halving (which uses a lot of energy for the special equipments to run the Bitcoin blockchain), LTSS spends no extra energy, as the Okcash blockchain runs thanks to every PC with an OK wallet and some coins, no extra special energy requirements. Now with IoT, Okcash and ROKOS developments thanks to the OK energy research department (DEOK) leaded by Kultus; soon green energy will be able to maintain the OK Blockchain, providing great benefits to the technology and environment synergy and harmony, maintaining efficiency, speed and security while preventing energy waste.

The Staking percentage at this moment is 20%, this are yearly percentages, meaning for example that you would get aprox 0.054% daily on average of the OK coins in your wallet while the 20% is active, this staking percentage changes with time in a process called OK Halving, this event take place on different years, anyone can see the expected years of halving in a more detailed list at: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1028368.msg15436603#msg15436603 .

There is also a new resource called http://okcashblockhalf.com where anyone can see real time statistics of the halving and a countdown to the next one, same way they can see the OK coins in circulation among other useful info.

Also for the more tech savvy, there is a resource getting built by Demartini over http://okcashdocs.com which will hold all the different Okcash related info and tech documentation.

BitcoinDood: If I’m not mistaken, you are also the lead dev for ROKOS. For anyone not familiar with the project it’s a Debian based Linux distribution for the Raspberry Pi. You can run a bitcoin full node with it, stake your OKcash, and the latest release “Flavors” has incorporated many additional altcoin wallets. Due to the low power consumption of the Raspberry Pi it really does make it ideal for “stake mining” and running multiple wallets. Could you explain a little about ROKOS and some of its features to any readers that may not be familiar with this project ?

In easy terms this means it is an operating system that turns your IoT device into a micro computer that can work with your cryptocurrency of choice, Bitcoin, Okcash, or any other cryptocurrency technology, as it is released Open Source, and it provides all the tools embedded on it to compile any of the other cryptocurrencies non included in the ROKOS version release.

All of this and other tools are ready to use out of the box in a minimalistic mix of art of design desktop by Numix project and Okcash, it also includes a ready to use Open Bazaar server for all those users or businesses that would like to start their own store as well, it’s basic idea behind was to break the cost wall of integration in this devices, hence creating a whole new trend of ideas and projects, merging IoT and the Cryptocurrency environment.

One of ROKOS OK Bitcoin Fullnode goals is to provide users with every tool they might need, so users/businesses can have the last word on decisions while using their platform and technologies.

It has been released more than 7 different versions in 2 tiers for more than 5 different IoT devices (pi b+(old version), pi zero, pi 2, pi 3, pine64+, bananapi Pro) and it has been downloaded more than 5000+ times.

So far it’s been released in 2 tiers, “Core” and “Flavors” like you mentioned and in the future there are coming tiers called “Light” and “HiddenName” (sorry, can not disclose that last one for now), but what I can say is that it is a pretty exciting project also, and a lot of different people and projects are involved on its success as well, from Tech News sites like TechCrunch to events like CoinFest UK to the OK and ROKOS tutorials Shbour is making, rmd73 testing, supporters like Chris Ellis and feedback from cryptocurrency network, same as community users and forums from the Bitcoin, Okcash and different cryptocurrency environments, all of them are part of the fuel and motivation behind its work and success. I can not wait to see how it continues to evolve, the vision behind it that unites us all is to Empower Everyone and Decentralize Everything (EEDE).

BitcoinDood: ROKOS is currently The Dood’s go to OS for the Rapsberry Pi. I’m currently running a twitter bot on it using Twython, and of course staking my OKcash daily. My laptop currently runs on an openSuse distro. Configuring wallets can be a bit of pain on a linux system. Has there been any consideration on porting ROKOS over to a full blown Linux distribution for use on laptops and desktops? I could really see linux users involved with cryptocurrency embracing a distribution like that.

OKtoshi: That is very nice to hear, I am very glad you are enjoying your system. At this moment we’ve been releasing automated scripts for linux system to do the job for you, but I can see ROKOS coming to full Linux distribution for laptops and desktops, in fact, I do like the idea a lot, consider it added to the ROKOS task list thanks to your final suggestion/request (as it has been suggested by other users within the community over the discord channels) so it means the community wants it, so we will get to work on it and get it released.

BitcoinDood:Seeing we’re talking Linux. Have you been following the Hyperledger project at all? Care to share any thoughts on Hyperledger? Do you think we will begin to see more linux based blockchain projects as a result of the Hyperledger project? Any thoughts on incorporating Hyperledged technology into ROKOS?

OKtoshi:It is awesome to see the Linux Foundation getting involved with Blockchain projects, I don’t know if you can tell but Linux is my favorite system, so I took this news great, and it also helps legitimize and establishes even more the crypto environment and movement.

I think it is still too early to see the total reach and collaboration it will create, but I can definitely see some of its developments integrated into ROKOS in the future.

BitcoinDood:Thanks so much for taking the time to answer these questions and sharing the OKcash story with my readers and I. Is there anything that hasn’t been covered that you’d like to talk about? Any new innovations or soon to be released features you would like to share with us today?

OKtoshi: Thanks to You and the Bitcoin Dood readers as well for your support in this first 2 years for Okcash and the community, to get the latest updates and developments on Okcash or ROKOS; I recommend you to join the communications server over http://discord.me/cryptocurrency and the OkcashTalk Forums, I’m just a small part of the whole picture, community and team are always working in new things coming out.

BitcoinDood: With your 2 year anniversary and all the other hard work you do, I really appreciate you taking the time out of your busy schedule to take this interview. I end every interview with the same last question. Could you share any thoughts, theories, or predictions that you might have for the future of cryptocurrency in general?

OKtoshi: As Bitcoin, Okcash, Crypto and IoT grows, the possibilities become unlimited. Crypto on fridge and kitchen items, on glasses, even on cloth, the age of Crypto wearables is coming soon, Crypto + self sustainability is another new area to get to born among others, bio hacking + crypto as well, crypto energy trading markets, and then when Crypto is really established some public ethical debates (that could turn political) between public vs anon chains.

BitcoinDood: Thanks again for all you do! You have to be one of my favorite devs in the altcoin space. I love all the work you do on both ROKOS and OKcash. The Dood wishes you and the entire OKcash community continued success with both OKcash, ROKOS and of course, all your future endeavors. Thanks again for your time, and all you do for the OKcash community 🙂

OKtoshi: Sounds like we’re on the good track, Thanks a lot for your support, kind words and invite, it has been a pleasure.

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